The Damned Holies (The Fallen Wars 1)

Chapter Twenty-Three

“Go to him. Make him feel better. Take a shower first, you reek of the humans.” She crinkled her nose at me, but patted her hand on my back for encouragement.

My clothes changed into a soft t-shirt and skinny jeans. I was instantly clean and flashed her a proud smile.

Hope tsked. “Don’t you miss the feeling of a good shower?”

“I still take showers, but this is so much more convenient.”

“Before you go… Aimee, did you really mean what you said earlier?” Her voice was low, but my hearing easily deciphered it and filtered it out from the background noise.

“Yes.”

“That’s what I was afraid of. We don’t want to go back, especially now that we know what it means to be free.” Her red brows were pulled tightly together and her eyes were far away, lost in a distant memory. She looked back at me once it was done. “I have a feeling this isn’t optional.”

I hugged myself as I looked across the ravers, it was my turn to look away. The humans had no idea. “I know. I don’t want to go either.”

“We have to. You don’t know what he’d do…”

I gave her a hard stare. “I know better than most.”

“That’s always a possibility, but there’s other things.” Hope ran her fingers through her short, red hair and tried to tuck it behind her ear out of habit. It was too short.

“Do you miss your long hair? I always thought it was lovely.” I changed the subject.

“I like this. It was time for a change. It will just take some getting used to.”

“I cut a foot off of mine. It had grown down to my thighs.”

“When you were Nephilim, it was always fairly short.”

“It was more convenient that way.”

Hope grinned mischievously. “You’re procrastinating.”

“Guilty.” I laughed. “It was working.”

“You’ve been avoiding him. Every meeting, he tries so hard to catch your gaze. I can practically hear his thoughts begging you for your attention, but I’m assuming you’ve been blocking him. You come late, so he can’t sit by you, and leave early, so he can’t follow you. We all see it.”

I sighed. “It’s difficult, Hope. I would feel guilty if I broke his heart, but I don’t know if I love him… Like I used to.”

“It’s because of Lucien, isn’t it?”

I jerked back, stunned. “How did you know?”

She shook her head, grabbing my left hand. She made the ring appear on my finger. I would always keep it invisible, but somehow she knew. “Womanly intuition, but I didn’t know it had went this far…” She trailed off.

“I don’t know what to do.” I looked away from the ring, and from her, so she couldn’t see my eyes change to blue.

The music disappeared and we were in a small room. “My home, in Paris.” She pulled apart the curtains that concealed a window, revealing a view of the Seine and the Eiffel Tower. “Sit on the bed. We need to talk.”

I complied with her commands and she came to sit next to me. “I really don’t know what to do.”

“You married him.”

“I thought I would be with him forever.”

“But what about your soul wasting away? Didn’t you know about that?” She clasped my hands in hers.